Powerunit failure?

[Steinspyd]

I have this friend (no really!), and his computer has stopped working. He could smell something burnt one day and it stopped booting. I've had a look at it, lights are going but no fans or anything. The motherboard looks fine.

There is a light on the side of the powerunit that is not going, it says 'test switch' next to it. So I gathered it was probably the powerunit that has gone bust, but I wanted to ask some more proficient people before continuing.

The computer is a Gateway P4.

Any thoughts would be much appreciated.

Thank you,

Hallgeir

 

[EricB]

it could be. gateway is notorious for underpowering their computers.

 

[aspire]

find another one and slap it in there and try booting if it does then have him buy a nice new one make sure you get the right connections

 

[Steinspyd]

Ok, I will get him to do that. Shouldn't be too expensive anyway if it turns out to be a deeper problem. Sorry about the vagueness of my question. Thanks all!

 

[EricB]

hopefully you can find a cheap one to fit that gateway case. I ended up buying another case and putting the mobo and accessories in it as the 350 watt power supply to fit my old gateway was $89.00 compare to $50.00 for a case with a 420 watts powersupply.